


I Second that Motion

by GrayEmbers



Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout: New Vegas
Genre: Dead Money, F/F, Post-Game, Sickfic, Trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-28
Updated: 2016-12-28
Packaged: 2018-09-12 19:37:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,128
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9087307
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GrayEmbers/pseuds/GrayEmbers
Summary: A series of short scenes exploring how the former courier and Christine bonded and supported each other at the Sierra Madre, and after ultimately splitting up, how the courier returned home and told Veronica.





	1. The Sierra Madre

**Author's Note:**

> This is a slight deviation from my usual courier Vegas canon designed originally to fill a Kinkmeme prompt: http://falloutkinkmeme.livejournal.com/7011.html?thread=19355235

-1.1

She’d been called many things in her time - cautious, watchful, detached, paranoid, hypervigilant - but few times in her life had the ex-courier been rubbed so raw to the core as the time spent captive in the Sierra Madre. In the first few days alone, Ryker had a bomb strapped to her neck by a manipulative megalomaniac, met complete strangers whose lives were allegedly tied to hers, consistently exposed herself to a toxic cloud, and struggled against a small horde of ghost-people who reanimated with alarming frequency. With her back constantly against the wall, she quickly exhausted her mental resources.

So, when Christine finally cornered her on the fourth day and made gestures undeniably related to sleeping, she bristled uncharitably. Out of everyone, only Christine had earned even a fraction of her trust, but dropping her guard enough to fall asleep within yards of half a dozen ghost-people? “Not on your life.”

Frustrated, Christine pointed at her, then the wall, and made another sleeping gesture. This time, she followed up by pointing at herself and then shielding her eyes as if scanning the horizon. To emphasize her point, she threw her bag on the ground by the shopfront window and leaned on the wall next to it, affording her a decent view of the streets outside. When she turned back to Ryker, one eyebrow was raised.

Exhausted barely covered how Ryker felt - she was only upright by virtue of chaining stimpacks for the last two days - but even if she wanted to give in to the heavy pressure behind her eyelids, her rattled nerves would never allow it. She’d been lost in vaults and trapped behind enemy lines, and she knew exactly what would happen if she attempted to sleep.

But faced with Christine’s determined stare, she couldn’t summon the energy to argue the point. Hoping that rest might take the edge off her exhaustion, she said, “One hour.” Then she slumped against the wall a few feet away, keeping her shoulder blades on the cool stone and resting her chin on her chest. From the corner of her eye, she watched Christine settle against the window to keep guard.

Sounds carried far through the stagnant air of the villa, and every creak and groan represented potential danger. Rather than sleep, what came were uncomfortable gaps in awareness followed by flinching awake at another sound with an edge of panic in the way her gaze scoured the area. Her lookout would turn to make eye contact, and Ryker would settle lower on the wall. Being so tantalizingly close to true rest only aggravated the weariness clouding her mind.

The discomfort of her position eventually killed her chances of falling asleep. The time of day was difficult to judge through the thick red mist covering the grounds, but even in daytime, the sun hardly penetrated far enough to warm the area. Activity usually kept Ryker warm enough, but now she felt gooseflesh prickling her arms and legs, and her butt and back pressing on cool stone only sapped more of her warmth away.

She didn’t expect her closed eyes to fool Christine, but a hand nudging her shoulder still caused her to jump a foot in the air. Christine held up her hands in a calming gesture, and Ryker frowned as she sat back against the wall. Then Christine folded her arms over her chest and acted as if she was shivering before pointing at Ryker and raising an eyebrow.

“I’m fine,” Ryker grumbled. Unconvinced, Christine held out both of her own hands palms down and looked up expectantly. After a moment of hesitation, Ryker held out her own hands in a similar manner. They were steady for a moment, but then another shiver started from her shoulders and traveled down her arms. Christine looked between the hands, her goosebumps, and her scowl. “Okay, I’m cold.”

When she slid back to the wall, Ryker wrapped her arms around her torso for warmth. For a minute, she was surprised Christine hadn’t pressed the issue; her occasional shiver must have been noticeable with only a few feet of space between them. Unless it wasn’t the cold that had initially concerned her. Difficulty sleeping wouldn’t cause tremors, but stimulant abuse alone would easily do the trick, not to mention jittery nerves and however the red cloud might be affecting her mind. 

Christine shifted, and Ryker glanced her way only to see Christine looking at her. She glared back, challenging her to comment on the continued shivering. Instead, Christine took one more careful look out the window before folding herself sideways against the wall and motioning for Ryker to scoot closer. The lookout still had a clear view, but she had to crane her neck to achieve it. 

Ryker hesitated. Trusting her to keep watch was one thing, but putting herself in a vulnerable position in close proximity? Still, of everyone and everything at the Madre, Christine was the only one looking out for her. It wasn’t hard to read honest concern in the expression accompanying the invitation to share body heat.

Swallowing her unease, Ryker slid along the floor until her shoulder bumped Christine’s chest. One of Christine’s shoulders rested against the wall, and when she offered it as a warm headrest, Ryker paused to consider their postures like puzzle pieces - inserting her head between a shoulder and a wall, her own shoulder behind a torso, her legs arching over folded knees, her butt snugly behind a thigh. If the extent of the contact surprised Christine, she managed to hide it well.

It wouldn’t’ve worked if she hadn’t been so goddamn tired. Years ago, Ryker had shared space like this with her late sister - one on watch and one curled up behind or on top of her - and even though this body belonged to a near stranger, the familiarity brought a sense of security that sitting three feet away from an attentive lookout hadn’t driven home. Not enough to fully sleep, but enough to doze between periods of Christine stiffening or adjusting her position. 

A wandering ghost ended what little peace they had. Christine shot it enough times to temporarily incapacitate it, hopped out the window, and severed its neck with a cosmic knife. By the time she returned, Ryker had brushed herself off and was ready to go. 

As Christine shrugged on her pack, Ryker caught her shoulder and said, “Hey - thanks.” She responded with a nod and a thin smile, paused, then seemed genuinely amused for a moment. She pointed to Ryker, held up three fingers, then made a sleeping gesture. Ryker flashed her a grin in response. “Yeah, yeah… you were very comfy.” 

-1.2

When the gala event began, the hissing and grinding of machinery - of pipes and sensors and fans - echoed through the switching station as they kicked into high gear. Although they’d cleared the rooms on their way in, Christine could hear dozens of ghost-people crawling out of the ductwork. The revival of the entire Madre doubtless put the entire population of ghosts and holograms on high alert, and even backtracking through the station could prove difficult, let alone making it all the way to the casino. 

And then there was the elevator.

The elevator was open in front of her. It would be fast and safe. She could hear the growing crowd of ghosts stalking through the facility’s halls nearby. But even louder, she could hear the creaking of the elevator shaft, a whistling of air and creaking cables reverberating on those cold, metal walls. She stared for an eternity, but her legs refused to move. 

Then a sharp ping startled her, and the elevator’s panel lit up with the up arrow as the doors began to slide closed. Christine leapt forward to throw her hand between the closing doors, causing a jolt of fear down her spine; the doors hesitated with her fingers between, then slowly pulled apart. Breathing quickly, she stepped into the elevator before she could change her mind - like ripping a radstinger out. 

Regret flooded in as the doors clamped shut and the tiny elevator car shuddered to life; panic rose that at any minute, hands or machines or worse might burst through the steel walls of the car because she’d seen stranger things here already, she’d felt steel claws tear her apart... and all she could do now was clench her fists and wait.

Directly aboveground where the elevator shaft ended, Ryker watched the elevator panel’s indicator climb to the surface. Her foot idly rolled a knife-spear back and forth where it had fallen next to its dead and beheaded ghost-person. All around her, half a dozen other dead foes were sprawled, but further afield were plenty of other ghosts responding to the racket of the gala’s grand opening. 

When the elevator car arrived, a chime sounded loud enough that Ryker winced and scanned the side streets for movement. Clearing the immediate vicinity of the elevator had paid off. She turned to slip into the opening elevator, but instead was rewarded with Christine stepping out and blinking from some combination of the sudden light and the thick red cloud. 

“Finally! I was starting to think you were coming up from the other entrance.” Christine shook her head and glanced at the bodies scattered around the area, so Ryker added, “I cleared the area here, but we ought to sneak by the rest of them. It’s hell all the way to the casino.” 

Christine nodded, businesslike, but Ryker noticed her stiff movement and the way she glanced back at the elevator doors as they sealed shut behind her. After their brief struggle to find an alternative to the elevator to trigger the opening ceremony, she’d worried Christine might try to risk the long way back on her own. “You okay?”

This time, Christine met Ryker’s gaze before nodding. Satisfied, Ryker was already turning to push onward when a hand wrapped around her wrist. As she paused to raise a questioning eyebrow, Christine’s hand slid down to lock fingers with her own. She squeezed her hand for a moment with a grateful look, and Ryker returned the gesture. “Come on,” she said softly, and she waited until their shoulders brushed before letting go of the hand. They had weapons to carry and streets to cross, but Ryker stayed close enough to sense the reassuring presence as they wove through the streets towards the grand casino.

-1.3 

As she descended the last of the stairs to join Christine at the banister overlooking the grand entrance, Ryker nodded towards the main doors standing between them and the toxic villa air. “Any other guests care to join us?” Their makeshift barricades still stretched the span of the doors, but the furniture - which they’d dragged mostly from the casino floor - had clearly been jostled loose. Luckily, the only movement on the first floor seemed to be a hologram in a hallway on the other side of the lobby.

Christine took a moment to clear her throat before saying, “Not this time.”

“Good. Then all that’s left is to deal with Dog, and…” 

As she trailed off, Ryker tapped the rim of her Pip-Boy, the gesture they’d come to use when speaking about Elijah. She did so absently, but the motion drew a look of interest from Christine which ultimately settled on Ryker’s face. “Why is it that you’re always gesturing at me? I couldn’t speak before, but I could hear just fine.”

Ryker stared at her a moment, caught between a reflexive denial and the realization she had indeed just used a gesture instead of saying two words. Instead, she made a thoughtful noise and said, “Do I?” Even when Christine had been mute, they’d conversed a fair amount when they weren’t wandering the villa or reluctantly following Elijah’s orders, and a few specific gestures stuck out in Ryker’s mind as something she’d mirrored back after finally figuring out what Christine meant. Sometimes it seemed more succinct to just gesture. “Well, it makes sense.”

“In what way?” 

“We’re generally within earshot of half a dozen things that want to kill us. I’m hardly going to shout across the villa to talk to you.”

Sounding more curious than accusatory, Christine pressed her with, “But you’re not silent while you do it. You’re just mimicking me.”

Although she didn’t seem offended, Ryker frowned and assured her, “I’m not mocking you.”

“I didn’t think you were.” 

“I don’t know, I don’t really think before I talk.” This admission caused Christine to nearly snort in laughter, which in turn caused her to wince and touch her throat. It was a criticism that had been directed at her long enough that Ryker said, “Yeah yeah, laugh it up. My point is, body language isn’t much different. If I’m not thinking about it, I just kind of autopilot.” 

Christine nodded slowly. With the last caveat added by Ryker, she didn’t have to bring up how the gesturing was reserved for their private conversations; she knew the tone of their interaction differed from how she acted with Dean or Dog. With the others, she was always on guard and often adversarial. Although she’d been prickly at first with Christine, some combination of the need for social contact and the raised bar of communicating through interpreted gestures had drawn them together. Ryker’s adoption of those same gestures had apparently been subconscious.

A coughing fit from Ryker drew Christine’s attention back to the present. Despite the relatively cleaner air inside the casino, her coughing seemed to worsen by the day. Sore throats were just one more misery they had in common. When she wiped her mouth and turned back around, Christine glanced quickly around the perimeter to be certain the noise hadn’t drawn any attention and said, “I think I get it. Thanks.”

She meant it as an end to the conversation, but Ryker couldn’t resist getting in the last word. “Good, at least one of us does.” She coughed again, covering her mouth this time before waving vaguely towards the staircase behind them. “I’m going to go pay Dog a visit. I’ll try to keep the collar explosions to a minimum this time.”

“Please do.” They parted quietly, Ryker to the stairs and Christine towards the first floor to probe the computer system a second time for connections to other systems coming online in the long dead casino.

-1.4

“Come _on_ , dammit!” Ryker struck her palm against the elevator door again, but the vault remained motionless and indifferent. Mechanical noises echoed all around, but none as panic-inducing as the rapid beeping of the collar against her neck. Already the frequency had increased once - twice as she pounded on the door again - but she had no way of knowing if Elijah tampered with the elevator. Time was running out.

Giving up, she spun around to sprint back to Elijah’s corpse in hopes of finding a key to her collar before -

Before the elevator opened. She froze, disbelieving, until the collar in the elevator began its steady beeping too. “Get in!” Christine waved her inside and hit the button for the first floor as Ryker all but threw herself into the car. As the doors rolled shut, she said, “I heard your collar start beeping over the intercom.” 

“Good timing.” 

Hesitantly, Christine asked, “Do you have a key for the collars?” 

Ryker shook her head as she slumped to the floor against the far wall. “When it started, I figured I only had time for one, so I ran for the elevator instead of searching his corpse.”

She nodded, but they both listened as Christine’s collar kicked it up a notch. They weren’t synced up; evidently, Christine would have an extra thirty seconds that Ryker wasted sprinting through the vault.

The beeping sped up faster than she’d ever heard before, and at least if she stayed hunched in the corner, Christine might escape the first collar’s explosion and save herself. Her fingers wrapped tight around the collar as if some sliver of bone and flesh might spare one of them the brunt of the explosion, spare them the fate of those skeletons scattered around the grounds.

Then, silence. She barely breathed. The mechanical stuttering of the elevator, rocking in its continued ascent, filled the space. The two exchanged a dazed look. 

With an unsteady inhale, Ryker let her arms drop to her side and laughed. She laughed nervously at first, then in relief, and continued into hysterics until her battered lungs transformed the motions into a coughing fit. When she caught her breath, ribs aching, red flecks dotted the hand she’d coughed into. 

Across the elevator, Christine leaned heavily on the wall and sunk to the floor. Finally, the elevator drew to a noisy stop, chimed once - they both flinched - and the car doors rolled open. Neither of them summoned the strength to stand and leave.

At length, Ryker asked, “What do you think the chances are that they’ll beep again when we go down there?” As Christine had pointed out after dragging Ryker into the elevator, they didn’t have the key yet to unlock the collars. “Wouldn’t that be just perfect - having to dodge in and out of there every half a minute searching for keys.” 

Christine took a steadying breath, exhaling slowly as she stared at the ceiling. “If he even had the keys on his person.” 

This took a moment to sink in, then Ryker groaned and dragged a hand over her face. “I cannot wait to finally get out of this hellhole and go home. I miss sunlight. At this point, I think I even miss being shot at by raiders.”

With only a vague mumble of agreement, Christine grabbed the elevator handrail and pulled herself into a stand. She offered a hand to Ryker who, tired, regarded it for a moment before grabbing on. When Christine tugged, Ryker began the initial movement to stand before slumping unhelpfully back to the ground, the inertia of which yanked Christine forward. She just barely caught herself on the wall above Ryker, preventing herself from completely falling on top of her.

Ryker snickered and grinned up at her. With one hand braced on the wall and the other still captive to Ryker, Christine hovered at an awkward lean a foot above Ryker’s head. When the initial surprise faded, she looked unimpressed. “You’re going to have to put forth at least minimal effort.” 

“My bad,” she said without an ounce of repentance. She scooted closer to the wall, and her legs trembled even from that simple exertion. Her breath still shook, and when she opened her mouth to tease Christine again, the words died in her throat. Embarrassed, she curled forward and squeezed Christine’s hand. “Thank you. For coming back for me.” 

The squeeze was returned, and Christine leaned down to rest her forehead against Ryker’s hair. “Thank you for helping me kill him. I’d been fighting this battle alone for so long…” Ryker reached her free hand upward to cup Christine’s cheek, but her fingers found the back of her neck instead and traced the curve to find her jawline -

Christine jerked backward, stumbling out of her lean and almost whacking Ryker in the face as her hand ripped out of their hold. Their eyes met, equally startled. Christine reached halfway to her own neck, hand hesitating below her scarred throat, and then her gaze flitted nervously around the elevator before she mumbled an apology and left. 

Ryker knew exactly what she’d done. Cursing under her breath, she struggled to her feet, let herself have one more good coughing spree in a vain attempt to clear her lungs, and followed Christine into Vera’s room.


	2. The Lucky 38

-2.1

When she finally crested the last hill separating her from Vegas and spotted the walls around Freeside, never had her city looked so welcoming and secure. She trudged towards Freeside in a singular fashion, noticing the road only long enough to keep from tripping over it on her beeline to the north gate. Around the door, a small group of men leaned against the reinforced walls, and she would have paid them little mind if one didn’t notice her, flag her down, and launch into some preamble about the city being a dangerous place.

Just as she fixed her dark glare on him, a Securitron stationed by the door shuddered into motion. The passive robot guard springing to life startled the two nearest men into reaching for their belts, but it paid no attention to anyone else as it greeted cheerily, “Ryker, is that you?” She planted her feet heavily as she stopped to stare at Yes Man’s signature face on the Securitron’s monitor. “Boy, they say distance makes the heart grow fonder, and I am just… so fond of you right now!” 

“How long?” Her voice cracked, in need of water and rest, and she coughed to clear her throat before clarifying, “How long was I gone?” 

Still retaining his cheer, Yes Man said, “I haven’t seen you for seventeen days and four hours.”

“Fuck.”

When she resumed her movement into Freeside, robot now following in her wake, the men let her go without comment. Yes Man helped hold the door open while saying, “I’m sure you needed a nice vacation and all, but you reeeally don’t look like that’s what you were doing.”

She hesitated in the doorway, the onslaught of moving bodies and noisy streets unnerving. Years wandering these streets had taught her to blend in, but the Madre had rewired every raw nerve to jump at the smallest sign of motion. “Thanks for noticing,” she muttered to Yes Man, aware of how conspicuous he made her as she set off stiffly toward the Mormon Fort.

The Fort had its usual bustle of Freesiders and Followers weaving between large canvas tents. As she approached the small station that served as a front desk for the operation, the worker asked, “What do you need?”

She only offered “patching up” by way of explanation, and the worker considered the tents for a moment before directing Ryker towards a tent with an open flap on the left side of the fort. She grimaced at it. “Don’t you have anything more private?” After two weeks under the eyes and thumb of a madman and several more days dragging herself across the wilderness alone, the prospect of spending hours exposed and vulnerable with a crowd of strangers nearby sounded worse than simply returning home to tend to her wounds herself.

The worker leveled a long look at her, disdain evident, but she glanced at Yes Man as she said, “Go talk to Dr. Farkas. She’s been in back all day.”

That she could do. Ryker waved Yes Man away, but the robot hovered by the entrance for a moment. “Oh, well then I’ll just keep watch out here alone! Say, are there any faces in particular I should watch out for…?”

“No,” she said heavily. “No one is following me.” 

She found Julie Farkas in the stock tent, and Julie found a research tent in the back corner with a free bed. When Ryker finally sat down and pulled her injured shins free of her boots, Julie looked first at the haphazard wrappings of gauze, then the scabbed shin visible between cracks missed by said wrappings, and finally up at Ryker.

Ryker shifted uncomfortably on the bed. The bandaging job had looked much more satisfactory at six in the morning after a short night sleeping under a rock outcropping. “Don’t look at me,” she grumbled defensively, “I’m running on like… three stims and two hours of sleep right now.”

“I hope you’re kidding,” she said, but when she met Ryker’s bloodshot eyes, her expression betrayed just how much she’d come to expect this from her. As Ryker hunched her shoulders in a shrug, the movement triggered a reflexive cough which spiraled into a bout of coughing that she tried to contain behind the back of her hand. 

Julie grabbed her forearm as she finished coughing, startling Ryker as her arm was rotated gently toward the doctor. Dotting the back of her hand were dots of red phlegm. She’d been hoping that would clear up once she reached fresh air. “I don’t think it’s blood or anything.” She received a dubious look as Julie pulled out a stethoscope. “I mean, the place was full of red gas clouds, couldn’t breathe in the densest parts…”

She fell silent as the stethoscope slid over her skin. “Cough again.” She complied, and now that her focus had been drawn to her condition, she realized how much her ribs and chest ached with the effort. “Well, you definitely have fluid buildup in your lungs.” Ryker wiped her hand on her pants as cold fingers pressed against her forehead. “Stay here a minute,” and the doctor left.

Ambient noise from the crowds of Freeside drifted around her tent, but the back corner of the Fort was far enough to be comfortably removed from the activity. Appreciating her exhaustion for the first time since doggedly setting out, Ryker stretched out on the bed with every intention of relaxing rather than sleeping. She fell into a troubled sleep within minutes.

-2.2

Time passed in hazy stretches between vivid dreams. After chaining stimpacks and pushing her body to extremes for the last two weeks, both sickness and exhaustion settled in for a stay. With her chronic and powerful instinct to hole up and tend her wounds alone, waking up in the Lucky 38 surprised Ryker far less than waking up with another person beside her bed.

Grumbling, Ryker rubbed her eyes and attempted to take a deep breath, an action that rewarded her with a nose blocked with snot and a coughing fit. Her ribs still ached from the effort. When she settled again, she turned her ill temper on her guest in the form of a scowl and, “What are you doing here?”

Veronica dog-eared the page of her book before setting it beside the chair she’d pulled up. “One, rude. Two, I’ve been in and out for the last two days. You let me in yourself.” 

“I find it hard to believe…” Her voice cracked, and she trailed off as pain flared through her throat. 

Filling the silence, Veronica said, “This is probably the most lucid you’ve been since I got here. Guess I’ll have to stop telling you all my dark secrets that I don’t want you to remember.” 

Although she was accustomed to Veronica’s teasing, it took her a moment to process the tone of the statement. Her mind felt sluggish. The aching of over half her body hardly helped. When she was offered a water bottle, Ryker mumbled her thanks and gingerly sat up to drink. Though lukewarm, the water soothed her burning throat all the way down.

“By the way,” Veronica said, “Why are you holed up on this floor?” 

Glancing around the room, Ryker realized the ornate room around her, while obviously somewhere in the Lucky 38, had none of the telltale signs of her modifications to the uppermost floors she frequented. Either she’d assumed she was in Veronica’s room or she’d simply failed to notice at all. Even so, the dark walls and enclosed space felt reassuring. “It’s… cozier.” She took another sip of water while retroactively piecing together her own logic. “Plus, stuff’s closer. Less walking.” Her own penthouse had entire wasted rooms to traverse, and the open floor plan felt less secure. If someone came after her in this weakened state, her own room would be the first place they searched for her. 

“It does have that nice hotel room feel,” Veronica agreed. 

Ryker snorted. “Hotel room feel, or actual hotel room?” 

Shrugging, she replied, “Well it’s not like you use it for that.” They fell silent a moment, Ryker adjusting her heavy lean against the headboard and Veronica watching. Weariness dragged at Ryker’s awareness, but she craved a conversation and its sense of normalcy more than a little buzzing in the back of her head could deter.

Unusually tentative, Veronica said, “So… while you were dreaming, or having a nightmare… you called out a name.”

Ryker groaned and then coughed to clear her throat. “Please tell me it wasn’t ‘Yes Man.’”

“You said ‘Christine.’”

Stomach turning, she reached up to rub her furrowed brow. “Did I?”

“Christine who?” The intensity of her tone and the stiff angle of her shoulders confused Ryker. Had she known Christine? They were both former Brotherhood members. But she was missing some obvious mental connection, something about the way Veronica’s eyebrows drew together when she said the name, and she couldn’t concentrate long enough to string it together. 

Too exhausted to chase the meaning, she simply replied, “...Royce.”

They were silent a moment, and then Ryker pushed her covers away and swung her feet over the edge of the bed. “Bathroom.” As she gripped the headboard for balance, Veronica bounced to her feet and offered a steadying hand that Ryker needed almost immediately upon attempting to stand. The room swayed, but she gripped Veronica’s shoulder and winced at the dull pain flaring through her shins.

Ryker couldn’t recall the way, but Veronica guided her to the bathroom with an ease that testified to just how much she’d been helping Ryker around the last two days. Once in the bathroom, she managed to use the toilet and wash her hands alone. With the faucet on low, she leaned over the sink to splash cold water on her face in hopes of clearing her head.

Outside the shut door, Veronica said, “So… you met Christine?” Ryker rested her still dripping forehead against the cool tile of the wall. It didn’t help. 

She grabbed the towel as she responded dryly, “No, I love shouting the names of strangers in my sleep.”

Veronica laughed once, nervous. “I wouldn’t call it shouting, more like…” As she fished for words, Ryker dragged the towel across her face until she caught sight of herself in the mirror. Her eyes and cheeks had hollowed out. She watched her own expression flicker when Veronica added, “You said something about leaving her behind.”

When no response came, her nervous chatter sped up. “Normally I wouldn’t be so paranoid, Christine is a common name and all, but it’s just, you also mentioned tech and danger and it’s an awful lot of -”

The bathroom door swung open, interrupting the rambling as Veronica turned. Leaning heavily on the doorframe, Ryker dragged the heel of her hand across her eyelids before saying, “I’m tired, Vee. Can we do this later?” She knew the request was unfair after treating Veronica to two days of oversharing whatever fever-induced nightmares she was having, but she could hardly remember saying anything at all let alone what Veronica’s reactions had been. 

The tense, pained smile only reinforced Ryker’s desire to delay the important conversation. “Of course. Sorry.” She offered her shoulder for support, and Ryker turned to nearly hack up a lung trying to clear the urge to cough before slumping onto Veronica for the assistance walking back to her bed. Another drink of water helped, but more than anything, Ryker just wanted to sleep. She pulled her covers over her shoulders and turned her back to Veronica, drifting off to sleep just as she heard the soft flutter of book pages.

-2.3

She found Veronica sitting on the bench in front of the floor-to-ceiling windows of the penthouse kitchen, right where Yes Man told Ryker she’d been sitting for the last two hours. The sun had long since set, and the view beyond the bright lights of Vegas buildings was limited to the dark silhouettes of mountains. But that’s not what Veronica was looking at.

Too quiet with socks on, Ryker wiggled the squeaky portions of the handrail as she descended the stairs nearest the kitchen. This drew Veronica’s attention, so Ryker motioned towards the fridge as she entered the room. “Want anything?” Veronica shook her head as Ryker went to grab a soda, hesitated, then picked out a bottle of fresh water. 

Sitting down on the other end of the bench, she opened her bottle in silence before coughing to clear the tickle in her throat. “So… you listened to the holotape?” 

Slowly, Veronica swung around on the bench and leaned her back against the window. “Yeah. It was, uh… well, thanks for bringing it back, anyway.” Her smile was thin and humorless. “You’re still a courier at heart.” Not for the first time, Ryker wondered if she should’ve let that particular sleeping dog lie. Normally, her unrepentant nosiness would lead her to listen to the tape before handing it over, but Elijah had locked this one down, and if that didn’t indicate the tone of its content, Veronica’s pained expression certainly did. 

But she’d seemed appreciative of the truth over the last few days. Certainly appreciative of conversations instead of Ryker babbling shit in her fevered sleep.

Ryker huffed softly. “Still can’t believe I didn’t put two ‘n two together earlier. I knew you’d mentioned Father Elijah before, so I should’ve figured Christine was from your bunker at the very least.” To top it off, Ryker had used her knowledge of the Brotherhood of Steel - knowledge gained primarily from helpling Veronica mosey up to and then cut ties with her bunker - to better connect with Christine.

“It’s a big organization, and we talked about it a long time ago,” Veronica assured her. Quick to forgive, and quicker to deflect. “Besides, there’s plenty of time for other acquaintances I mentioned to go off the rails and torture you into capturing old tech for them.” She managed to grin and sound excited. “Ooh, maybe we should make a list?”

Voice flat, Ryker said, “Okay. We’ll put ‘former mentor’ and ‘former lover’ at the top and cross them off.” Veronica’s smile faltered. Then, softer, “You never really moved on, did you?”

Veronica laughed nervously. Smoothed her shirt. Confirmed indirectly by asking, “So… Christine is still back there? Where you got this sick?”

Ryker made a show of trying to inhale through her nose and sucking a wad of snot down her throat. At least the antibiotics had considerably shortened her list of symptoms. She took a long sip of water before assuring her friend, “Christine was doing much better than me lungs-wise. Possibly because of her otherwise inadvisable Autodoc visits.” Even before she left, Ryker had some inkling that her coughing bordered on concerning, but all the gold in the world couldn’t convince her to step into an Autodoc after seeing the way Christine flinched away from any touch near her neck.

Veronica echoed the question Ryker had been asking herself all week: “Why did she decide to stay?”

Ryker shook her head slowly. “I don’t know. I tried to get her to come back with me. I wanted her to…” To leave that hell behind, to let go, to accompany her home, to open up, to smile and laugh again. She turned her head to stare absently at the distant horizon, where everything beyond Vegas’ light pollution was bathed in appropriate darkness. “... I don’t know.” 

Where words failed, her tone carried everything Veronica needed to read between the lines. “I never thought I’d see you fall for someone. Y’know, romantically.” Veronica didn’t feel the need to add that she’d seen a lot of Ryker, the good bad and ugly, yet somehow this distant longing struck her as completely out of sync.

Ryker turned to meet her friend’s gaze, playing the words over in her head as if hearing the sentiment out loud changed the way her heart sat heavy in the pit of her stomach. “Me neither.” She hadn’t needed anyone since her sister died, hadn’t needed anyone during her entire time in Vegas, and maybe she didn’t need Christine but she sure as hell longed for that warm shoulder to sleep on. 

Though their expressions were both solemn, no animosity hung between them over the unacknowledged love triangle. Huffing a soft laugh, Ryker turned her gaze away. “She’s really something, huh?” 

“Well. What do we do now?”

Something dangerously akin to fear darkened Ryker’s expression. “I can’t go back there.” She meant that both physically, as the lung damage was shaping up to be permanent, and also mentally. She’d taken a long soak in an ornate tub the day prior, but no amount of soap could wash away the feeling of that place clinging to her skin. 

If anyone was going after Christine, it would be Veronica. Their eyes met, passing a silent understanding.

Carefully neutral, Ryker said, “So, how do you want to play it?”


End file.
